Golf Ball Materials

Golf ball materials have changed substantially over the last several hundred years. From the wooden golf balls of the 1500s to present day plastic balls, human ingenuity has changed the face of the ball and the game. Golf Digest Magazine is a great source for more information about the sport and the evolution of golf ball manufacture.

The invention of golf balls

The Dutch invented golf using wooden balls and clubs. After realizing that the wooden balls could not attain much velocity, they started experimenting with leather balls. The Scottish perfected the design by boiling leather balls, letting them harden and then painting them the white color that they still have today. These traditional golf balls were almost exactly the same size and weight as modern golf balls.

Current adaptations

In the 1800s, the famous tire company B.F. Goodrich began making rubber golf balls. These balls were tested and tried until the 1950s when a new form of resin was invented. This evolved into what is now the outer shell of the golf ball, with the original rubber ball still making up the interior. The golf ball's exterior and interior materials continued to evolve until around 1996. The current ball has increased the distance achieved by an average of six yards. For an avid golfer, that is quite a bit of difference.

Now that you have read about golf ball materials, you are undoubtedly thankful that they have evolved in the way that they did. Gone are the days of searching for hard hunks of leather in the sand. Increased gold ball aerodynamics and distance have made golf into the sport that it is today.